Confidence drops as cyber-attacks become more sophisticated

Cisco has released its 2016 Annual Security Report today, with the results showing how businesses acknowledge the risks with going digital, realise they’re not really up-to-date, which leads to degrading confidence in the boardroom.

According to the report, less than half (45 per cent) of organisations, globally, are confident in their cyber-security measures and believe attackers are becoming more sophisticated and dangerous.

An overwhelming majority agree how regulators and investors expect businesses to manage their cyber-security risks and provide a more transparent view of any future risks.

Another key finding suggests that the infrastructure to protect from cyber-attacks is growing older – in the past year, there has been 10 per cent less companies saying their security measures are up-to-date. What’s even more interesting is that 92 per cent of internet devices run known vulnerabilities, and 31 per cent of all devices are no longer supported by the vendor.

Large enterprises are fairly solid in terms of keeping safe – it’s the SMBs where the problem lies. The report claims how SMBs use fewer defence tools.

The problem of being short on staff is being handled by outsourcing, Cisco’s report claims. Consulting, security auditing and incident response are among the things being handled by outsourced staff. SMBs have seen a jump in outsourced staff of 23 per cent in 2015, over 14 per cent a year before.

One of the biggest problems businesses are facing is the time required to notice a breach – it usually takes anywhere between 100 and 200 days which is, as Cisco puts it, “unacceptable”.